Toronto is falling behind in its plan to roll out designated bicycle lanes. What is the problem? Public consultation drives up the cost from $20,000 per kilometer to $40,000 according to Cycling Committee chair, Adam Giambrone. Any resistance to the lanes from city councilors basically means they don't go ahead. It seems that even marginally impeding the flow of cars in the core just isn't worth the political cost.

One of the problems we are told is that downtown streets are narrower than those in the suburbs (don't get us started on that) and, as a result, bicycles get in the way of cars. Anyone who has visited a European city will know that bicycles and cars can effectively share narrow streets. That is not the problem. The truth is that until gas reaches $2.00 per litre and people can no longer afford to drive their oversize, overweight SUVs, bike lanes will languish in the city's bureaucratic backwaters.

World class city indeed.

1. Councilors don’t want to be thrown out of office by their SUV driving constituents. End of story. Changing driving habits will take leadership something that is sadly lacking in Toronto. Did I just hear one of the forty planes a day take off and land from the island airport that was supposed to be closed??

   Posted by Jeff Benninger  on  07/10  at  06:08 PM

2. As a cyclist, I’m prepared to consider multiple paths toward making Toronto a better city for biking. Dedicated bike lanes are certainly a priority. But other measures will also help make biking safer (and will encourage more people to bike), chief among them educating drivers (and cyclists) about road safety and etiquette, and enforcing the rules of the road (these too may require some tweaking). Segregated bike lanes aren’t much help if drivers resent our presence everywhere else.

   It is clear (to me, at least) that many of the difficult interactions between motor vehicles and bikes in this city could be eased by communication and patience. I find many (not all!) taxi drivers, large delivery truck operators, and TTC drivers quite considerate and aware of cyclists. They give me room, and so I try to give them room, too, by pulling in to let them pass. This seems especially true along Dundas West, where there’s so much going on in all directions that drivers seem especially aware. There’s no bike lane along Dundas West, but in my view it’s one of the safest routes to commute along (World Cup season excepted).

   But one day last week I cycled eastbound a number of times past the AGO construction sute, where the street narrows because of the construction hoardings. On the first pass, I was able to cycle alongside the vehicles travelling through this narrowed passage: everybody was generous, aware, and travelling safely. On the second eastbound pass, I was the first into the narrowed portion, and the car behind drove slowly so as not to crowd me. This enraged the driver of the van travelling behind the first car so much that he blared his horn all the way through the block-long passage. When he emerged (less than a minute later), he blared his horn right into my vulnerable back, and then lowered his window to scream at me for giving him the finger. “You don’t have to swear,” he shouted.

   Posted by Amy Lavender Harris  on  07/11  at  07:25 AM

<< Back to main